NEW DELHI (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke briefly Thursday at a meeting of top diplomats from G20 nations in the first high-level meeting between the two countries in recent months.
US officials said Blinken and Lavrov spoke for about 10 minutes on the sidelines of the G-20 conference in New Delhi. The brief meeting came as relations between Washington and Moscow have soured with rising tensions over Russia’s war with Ukraine.
A senior US official said Blinken used the discussion to make three points to Lavrov: that the US will support Ukraine in the conflict as long as it takes to end the war; that Russia should reverse its decision to suspend participation in the conflict. The nuclear treaty New START and the fact that Moscow releases the American prisoner Paul Whelan.
The official, who spoke to reporters on condition of anonymity to discuss the private conversation, said Blinken “disproved” Lavrov of any notion he might have that U.S. support for Ukraine is waning.
The official declined to characterize Lavrov’s response, but said Blinken did not believe there would be any change in Russia’s behavior in the short term.
Russia did not immediately comment on the substance of the conversation, but Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Blinken had asked to speak with Lavrov.
Olivier Douliery/Piscina Photo via AP
It was their first contact since last summer, when Blinken called Lavrov about a US offer to Russia to free Whelan and arrest former WNBA star Brittney Griner. Griner was later released in exchange for jailed Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, but Whelan remains detained in Russia after being accused of espionage.
The last time Blinken and Lavrov met in person was in Geneva, Switzerland, in January 2022, on the eve of the Russian invasion. At that meeting, Blinken warned Lavrov of the consequences Russia would face if it went ahead with the planned military operation, but also tried to address some of the grievances Russian President Vladimir Putin has made about the US and NATO .
These talks proved inconclusive as Russia continued with its invasion plans, and Blinken then canceled a later scheduled meeting with Lavrov that had been set for just two days before Moscow finally invaded on the 24th February 2022.
The two men have attended several international conferences together since the start of the war, most notably the most recent meeting of G-20 foreign ministers in Bali, Indonesia last year, but did not meet face-to-face until Thursday.
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